New here and have tried searching but can't seem to find what I'm after.

Basically I want to create a registration form for a website using PHP and MySQL. The form needs to have all the standard fields like:

UsernamePasswordNameDOBEmail

But I also want to have a couple of extra questions in the form, these are:

Gender - Now am I right in thinking I should use ENUM for this with the values ('m','f') ??

My next two are the ones that I'm totally stuck on, I want to have one question in the form that has a drop down box as the choices, for example:

Q. How often to you exercise?Then the answers: 1 a week, 2 week, 3 a week, 4 or more a week

The other one is I'd like to have check boxes as the possible answers.

Now, I'm struggling to figure out where to go here, I have my page built with PHP and the form inside it, and I'm happy to build the table in MySQL but I don't know what to set the values for those two answer categories as? Am I right in thinking that the answers need to be selected from a different pre-built table with the choices defined? If so, how do I do so and then save the selected choices in the "users" table that will store the data for my new registered user?

I hope I've made sense?

Many thanks in advance guys!

StarLion
—
2013-01-14T17:09:35Z —
#2

Welcome to SitePoint!

The question I'm going to ask to better answer you is this;

What do you want to be able to DO with the data?

jonnyjohnson
—
2013-01-14T17:17:59Z —
#3

Hi StarLion,

Thanks for replying!

Ok, so for the one that is (in my head) a drop down selector, once the data has been submitted by the user and they've registered. I essentially want to be able to run queries and select only the users who chose "2 a week" or run a query that selects only the people that chose "5 or more" etc

Does that make sense?

I guess I'm just wanting to know how the best way to use PHP and MySQL to record information selected from a drop down box, into my "users" table so that I can in future, run queries based on their responses.

I hope I'm making sense!

Thanks again.

imsas
—
2013-01-15T03:14:41Z —
#4

If you expect to have multiple selections for the checkox question I would recommend keeping the values in an array, receive that array on the other end and loop through it to save into your database..

2ndmouse
—
2013-01-15T10:17:01Z —
#5

jonnyjohnson said:

Q. How often to you exercise? Then the answers: 1 a week, 2 week, 3 a week, 4 or more a week

I don't understand why you want to provide check boxes for a question that can only have 1 answer. Surely, radio buttons or a drop-down would be preferable. Unless I've got the wrong end of the stick??

jonnyjohnson
—
2013-01-15T10:43:20Z —
#6

Hi, sorry - yes that's the one that I want for a drop down but am struggling to know how to do it??

The one with check boxes I'd like to have a choice of answers for example favourite sports and they then select from a list by putting a check in the box.

But it's the drop down with the exercise habits that I'm really stuck on.

Thanks,

2ndmouse
—
2013-01-15T10:54:52Z —
#7

Is this what you mean? The selected value will be parsed with the rest of your form data:

<select name="exercise_habits">
<option value="Once a week">Once a week</option>
<option value="Twice a week">Twice a week</option>
<option value="Three times a week">Three times a week</option>
<option value="Four or more times a week">Four or more times a week</option>
</select>

StarLion
—
2013-01-15T11:48:31Z —
#8

or.. you could just give the values as 1,2,3,4 and not parse them other than to check if they're an INT